Tony Awards 2014 Winners

Let's not bury the lede here, Neil Patrick Harris is not just a Tony star, but a Tony supernova. He has already proven himself the ultimate host the past few years, but this year he was officially welcomed into the Broadway fold by winning his first Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical in Hedwig and the Angry Inch. The show picked up four awards total, highest tally of the night, including one for Best Musical Revival and Featured Actress Lena Hall. Hall and Harris put on an epic rock performance (see below) complete with Harris walking out into the audience and getting close and personal with Orlando Bloom, Samuel L. Jackson, and Kevin Bacon. The complete list of winners are below:

Best Play: All the Way
Best Musical: A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder
Best Revival of a Play: A Raisin in the Sun
Best Revival of a Musical: Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Best Actor, Play: Bryan Cranston, All the Way
Best Actress, Play: Audra McDonald, Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill
Best Actor, Musical: Neil Patrick Harris, Hedwig and the Angry Inch
Best Actress, Musical: Jessie Mueller, Beautiful: The Carole King Musical
Best Feat. Actor, Play: Mark Rylance, Twelfth Night
Best Feat. Actress, Play: Sophie Okonedo, A Raisin in the Sun
Best Feat. Actor, Musical: James Monroe Iglehart, Aladdin
Best Feat. Actress, Musical: Lena Hall, Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Best Direction of a Musical: A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder
Best Direction of a Play: Raising in the Sun
Best Book of a Musical: A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder
Best Costume Design for a Play: Twelfth Night
Best Costume Design for a Musical: A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder
Best Scenic Design for a Play: Act One
Best Scenic Design for a Musical: Rocky
Best Lighting Design for a Play: The Glass Menagerie
Best Lighting Design of a Musical: Hedwig and the Angry Inch
Best Choreography: After Midnight
Best Original Score: Bridges of Madison County
Best Orchestrations for a Musical: Bridges of Madison County
Best Sound Design for a Musical: Beautiful: The Carole King Musical
Best Sound Design in a Play: Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill

Nomination leader A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder picked up the top prize of the night, Best Musical, along with three other prizes including Best Director tying it with Hedwig for most wins. It was a night where the prizes were spread out a bit with Best Play Revival winner A Raisin in the Sun taking home 3 wins. Best Play went to All the Way and its lead actor Bryan Cranston won Best Actor. Best Actress in a Play went to the singular Audra McDonald for her Billie Holiday in Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill. With her win, she became the winningest actor in Tony history and also the first actor to win in all four acting categories. Jessie Mueller won Best Actress in a Musical for Beautiful: The Carole King Musical beating out stiff competition.

Host Hugh Jackman began the show hopping non-stop for 3.5 minutes and his energy and charm never faltered as the night went on. His oddest bit may have been his "Music Man" rap collaboration with T.I. and LL Cool J while one of his best had to have been his interaction with/presentation of the Best Actress in a Musical nominees. The rest of the show was fine even though most of the show performances weren't up to par (i.e. making me want to see their shows). Plus I was vehemently against featuring performances from shows that haven't been shown on Broadway (Sting's The Last Ship, Finding Neverland). Maybe if they got rid of those, they would've had time to present some of the technical categories especially Choreography, Book, Score, and Orchestrations. The latter two awards by the way went to The Bridges of Madison County. At least the gayest award show ever gave us this beautiful duo to present:

Matt Bomer + Zachary Quinto = GAYPLOSION

Finally, as big a fan as I am of Wicked and the song "For Good," I wanted something slightly more epic for the 10th year celebration of that show. Would it have been THAT difficult to ask Idina Menzel (who was already there) and Kristin Chenoweth to have made a cameo? Below the cut are three videos from the show: Jackman's opening and my favorite two performances (Hedwig and Gentleman's Guide).

Brief Thoughts Before the Tony Awards

I'm looking forward to the Tony Awards tonight as it has been one of the most enjoyable awards shows to watch in the past few years (only rivaled by the Fey-Poehler-hosted Golden Globe shows) mostly thanks to the ace hosting job of Neil Patrick Harris and fun performances throughout the night. This year Hugh Jackman will host for a fourth time with Harris nominated for Best Actor in a Musical for Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Unfortunately, I haven't seen Hedwig, but I'm very much rooting for Harris to pick up the trophy. His show actually got the second most nominations with eight and his biggest competitor comes from the show with the most nomination...

A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder was nominated for 10 Tony Awards and is the best tally of any show this year. It's the front-runner to win Best Musical and has more than a fighting chance in the rest of the categories it's nominated for. I *did* see this after the Tony nominations were announced and I completely understand why it garnered so much love. The songs are hilarious, the leads are indefatigable, and the whole thing is just fun. The only other musical I saw this season was...

The Bridges of Madison County only managed four nominations including one for Best Actress Kelli O'Hara who really poured her everything in the role of Francesca. I saw the musical at the recommendation of some friends and I'm so happy I got to see her sing these songs live. Since I haven't seen any of the other nominees in her category, I'm pretty much rooting for her by default, but golly that'd be great.

When it comes to the plays, I have even less to say because the only two plays I saw this season garnered a whopping zero nominations. And while I didn't expect Romeo & Juliet starring Orlando Bloom to light it up on nomination morning, I was quite shocked that the Patrick Stewart-Ian McKellen starrer Waiting for Godot laid a goose egg. Well, at least we'll always have their Instagram snapshots. In terms of a frontrunner, Act One starring Bryan Cranston (an almost lock to win tonight) seems to be in the lead for Best Play while The Glass Menagerie and Twelfth Night are duking it out in Best Revival of a Play. My roommate actually saw Twelfth Night this season (and loved it) on the same day I saw last year's Musical Revival winner Pippin. 'Twas a great day.

Like Cranston, it seems like a safe bet to predict Audra McDonald to pick up her sixth (!) win for Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill. If she does win, she would have won a Tony Award for Lead and Featured Actress in both plays and musicals. In the end, I wished I had gotten to see more shows, both plays and musicals. Hopefully a few of them will stick around this summer so I can try. Now on with the show!

Tony Awards and Birthday Boy Neil Patrick Harris

Neil Patrick Harris was the first celeb I gave a birthday shout out to on this blog and today he turns the big 4-0! Happy Birthday!

He will be wrapping up the final season of his hit show How I Met Your Mother during this upcoming TV season, but he should be able to land on his feet afterwards. At the very least, he can always hosts awards shows for a living. In fact, he just brilliantly hosted the Tony Awards for a fourth time last Sunday with his usual mix of show-stopping numbers and charming asides. Speaking of show-stopping numbers...

He deservedly got a standing ovation off the bat with an epic opening number that literally had everything Broadway has to offer:



He then was in the mix for one of the most inspired numbers ever held at Tonys with a few Broadway vets lamenting their canceled TV shows:



Finally, he ended the show with his usual Lin-Manuel Miranda-penned rapping recap of the night with bonus appearance of the amazing Audra McDonald who literally dropped the mic:



If I had it my way, every awards shows would only be hosted by Neil Patrick Harris, Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, and Hugh Jackman... in any combination. After the cut, a full list of the Tony Awards winners and very brief non-Neil Patrick Harris thoughts...

Doctor Who's Arthur Darvill in Broadway's Once

Apparently Broadway is on my mind as evidenced by my first post of the month as well as this post coming up. As I said yesterday, I wish I got to see more shows than I actually do. One of those shows I still have yet to see is last year's Tony winner for Best Musical Once.

Never mind that I absolutely fell head over heels in love with the film starring Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová and listened to the Oscar-winning song "Falling Slowly" for a million times, but from everything I've heard from other people who have seen the stage production, it's apparently quite an experience. How could it not with a stage that houses an actual working bar used for intermission and the soulful music by Hansard and Irglová? I really, really wanted to see it with the original stars Cristin Milioti and Tony winner Steve Kazee in the lead roles, but they both left the show just a couple months ago.

The silver lining, however, is that one of my absolute favorite actors in recent years, Arthur Darvill of Doctor Who fame, has been recently cast as the male lead with Joanna Christie. Apparently they were hired as some sort of British exchange program of some sort, which at least puts them geographically closer to the Irish roots of the story. I heard the news while traveling on a train with some friends and they could tell you how insane my reaction was. There might have been screaming involved. I really, really like Darvill and it looks like he's going to be New York bound for the next 9 months playing Guy in Once. You know what I'll be doing!

Ready, Set, Blog: Smash! Tony Awards Nominations!

Let's just say my blogging hiatus over the past two months (9 posts total!) had to do with work and life interfering with quality writing time, but that would be implying this blog was actually known for its quality writing! Wonder if I can at least post something daily this month. Why not? No time like the present though. Watch this fail...

Megan Hilty as Marilyn in Smash

Speaking of watching things fail, let's talk about Smash shall we? Yes, I'm still watching the totally cancelled show which NBC shuttled off to Saturdays to die, but only because it really does take a lot for me to completely drop a show (hell I still watch Glee after all). With that said, how awful was this week's episode which ended with the ridiculous cliffhanger of Kyle possibly getting run over? Seriously?! As if they haven't already been hammering the parallels between Hit List and Rent throughout the season, they go and evoke the tragedy of Jonathan Larson to the proceedings? Even if Kyle survives, he'll probably be severely banged up and it all just feels like a cheap and tasteless ploy indicative of a show that seems to have been flailing all of its life. It's sad since its pilot was pretty damn great and just as recently as the episode prior, I was reminded how this show really could've been something worthwhile. In that episode, Bombshell finally had its opening night with the right actress portraying the part and kicking ass with that final number. The loathsome duo of Karen and Jimmy were even tolerable then with the former showing rare (very rare) nuance in her scenes watching Ivy play "her" part and afterwards in the dressing room consoling Ivy and the latter making some effort in trying to be something other than a complete jackass. Unfortunately both returned to heinous form this past week with Jimmy reaching levels of doucheyness I didn't even think was possible to reach and Karen back to her usual blank and insipid line deliveries (and now seducing Derek? UGH!). A match made in hell.

Of course the end game is clear here. Hit List will inevitably transfer to Broadway to go up against Bombshell forcing Ivy and Karen yet again to compete with one another (as if anyone would actually think it's a real competition) for the Tonys. The winner in the end is no one because UGH THIS SHOW. Now can this series just end already so we can get the special edition DVD that includes the full Bombshell musical?

The cast of Kinky Boots

And since I already mentioned it, just a few quick words on the recent and real Tony Awards nominations. Even though I live in NYC, I actually don't get to see Broadway shows as much as I would like, which also means while I'm fairly familiar with the shows that are out there, it's hard to actually form thoughts on the Tony Awards noms. The one thing I was surprised about was the Best Musical nomination for Bring It On, which I did see and thought was a fun time, but hardly worthy of a Tony nomination. Fellow nominees Kinky Boots and Matilda lead with the most nominations and it seems like it'll be a fight to death between those two. I'm hoping to check them both out especially since, like Bring It On, I quite liked their film versions. It'll also be nice seeing first-time Tony nominee Stark Sands of American Idiot fame in Kinky Boots looking as adorable as ever. Other than Bring It On, there are only two shows nominated I've seen. The first is The Mystery of Edwin Drood nominated for 5 Tony Awards including Best Revival of a Play and for Featured Actor Will Chase who played Michael Swift in Smash in its first season. The second show was The Heiress which only picked up 2 nominations including a very well-deserved one for Judith Ivey. Its main stars Jessica Chastain, Dan Stevens, and David Strathairn were all not nominated. The show itself won't lack for celebs with Tom Hanks, David Hyde Pierce, Nathan Lane, Cicely Tyson, Holland Taylor, Tony Shalhoub, Judith Light all nominated. Katherine McPhee is probably not invited though, but I really wish Sebastian Stan's abs were.

Tony Awards 2012 Winners

Once was the big winner of the night taking home 8 of its 11 Tony nominations including Best Musical and Best Actor. Peter and the Starcatcher had the next best tally with 5 wins despite losing Best Play to Clybourne Park (its only win). Death of a Salesman and Porgy and Bess also took top honors. The complete list of winners are below:

Best Play: Clybourne Park
Best Musical: Once
Best Revival of a Play: Death of a Salesman
Best Revival of a Musical: Porgy and Bess

Best Actor, Play: James Corden, One Man, Two Guvnors
Best Actress, Play: Nina Arianda, Venus in Fur
Best Actor, Musical: Steve Kazee, Once
Best Actress, Musical: Audra McDonald, Porgy and Bess
Best Feat. Actor, Play: Christian Borle, Peter and the Starcatcher
Best Feat. Actress, Play: Judith Light, Other Desert Cities
Best Feat. Actor, Musical: Michael McGrath, Nice Work If You Get It
Best Feat. Actress, Musical: Judy Kaye, Nice Work If You Can Get It

Best Direction of a Musical: John Tiffany, Once
Best Direction of a Play: Mike Nichols, Death of a Salesman
Best Book of a Musical: Once
Best Costume Design for a Play: Peter and the Starcatcher
Best Costume Design for a Musical: Follies
Best Scenic Design for a Play: Peter and the Starcatcher
Best Scenic Design for a Musical: Once
Best Lighting Design for a Play: Peter and the Starcatcher
Best Lighting Design of a Musical: Once
Best Choreography: Newsies
Best Original Score: Newsies
Best Orchestrations for a Musical: Once
Best Sound Design for a Musical: Once
Best Sound Design in a Play: Peter and the Starcatcher

Despite only seeing one Broadway show this season (Godspell) which wasn't even nominated for anything, I still thought the ceremony was thoroughly entertaining. Most of that is certainly due to Neil Patrick Harris, who called the Tony Awards "Fifty Shades of Gay" right up front, and his fun and easy way of hosting--a song and dance number about the theater to open the show, some witty jokes sprinkled throughout including another jab at Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark, and a recap song to close it all out. It also helped that the winners across the board delivered wonderful speeches from Steve Kazee's ode to his mother to Nina Arianda's glee at receiving an award from Christopher Plummer. Or how about the great reaction of underdog James Corden when he won or Audra McDonald's tearful message to her daughter? I also enjoyed the short and sweet presentation of Hugh Jackman's wife giving him a special Tony award.

The performances were mostly good with a few or so exceptions which I'd rather not go into (ahem Ghost). I'd rather focus on the welcome performance from last year's winner Book of Mormon to open the show (though I was missing original stars Andrew Rannells and Josh Gad), the exuberant gymnastic skills of the Newsies cast, and the heartbreaking and beautiful show put on by Kazee and the Once ensemble. I also found the montage of Best Plays particularly well done if a bit odd to do so in musical style. I halfheartedly livetweeted the show last night, which I hadn't planned on, but I was plenty amused that my tweet about losing nominee Andrew Garfield going home with Emma Stone still making him a winner got a lot of attention.

Andrew Garfield Looking Adorkable

I was just fine missing out on last weekend's MTV Movie Awards, but I do somewhat regret not being able to immediately see the hotness that was Andrew Garfield walking the red carpet. For anyone else who missed it, here he is looking adorkable in Prada:

He was there with his current paramour Emma Stone to promote their film The Amazing Spider-Man which is set to be released in less than a month. Onwards and upwards though as tonight Garfield has a 1 in 5 chance to walk away with a Tony Award as he is nominated for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his work in Death of a Salesman alongside Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Pundits are calling him one of the favorites to win, locked it a two-way race with theater vet and Peter and the Starcatcher actor Christian Borle.

Seize the Day! Newsies Turns 20!

Today is the 20th Anniversary of Newsies which as it turns out was also my very first Christian Bale movie. It may have also been one of my very first musicals. Of course a musical starring a bunch of boys set in New York City would be my first musical. How typical. In any case, the film revolves around the newsboys strike of 1899 that actually took place. There's a lot of caps, vests, newspapers, and really exaggerated New York accents. But you should watch it just to see Bale sing and dance like, for example, in the film's most popular number "Seize the Day" which you can see below...



Now perhaps because they wanted to take advantage of the 20th Anniversary or just coincidence, there's a new Broadway musical version based on the film starring Jeremy Jordan. I have yet to see it, but I'm going to do my best to check it out before it goes away later this summer. See the trailer for the Broadway show after the jump...

Day by Day: Broadway's Godspell

Happy Easter to anyone who celebrates it! Other than accompanying my dad to church this morning, I didn't really do anything special. Gone are the days of dressing up for Church then rushing over to someone's house to color and hunt for some eggs. But I'd like to take this opportunity to highlight Broadway's newest revival musical Godspell.


Before this year, whenever I heard people talk about Godspell, my mind would immediately think about the 1973 film starring Victor Garber as Jesus. As a product of Catholic education, I had the opportunity to see the film a few times. With its blend of holy Scriptures (based mostly from the teachings of Jesus Christ) and "modern" pop-rock songs, it was definitely one of the more fun ways my old teachers got us to learn our lessons. I also highly enjoyed the film's used of New York City locations as well as the cast's diversity and free-spiritedness. It was only this year, however, that I found out Godspell was actually a musical stage production first and that this new version starring Hunter Parrish as Jesus will be a Broadway revival. I was stoked.

Victor Garber and the current cast of the Broadway revival w/ Hunter Parrish

Luckily I have been able to see this show now twice and absolutely loved. Parrish as Jesus was perfectly cast not only because of his superbly underrated voice, but also because of his infectious madcap energy (which he was also able to tone down for the more somber parts of the musical). The rest of the ensemble are as diverse and free-spirited as their movie counterparts and all-around excellent. They were so great that the first time I saw the show with half the ensemble replaced by their understudies, you really couldn't tell that who you were watching were last-minute replacements. They were all that good. The theater-in-the-round aspect took some getting used to as well as sitting on pillows right up against the stage, but all of that just added to the engrossing experience. The stage itself reminded me of Mary Poppin's bag with water, trampolines, and many props coming forth from its depth at various points. While the songs remain mostly the same, the script is of course tailored specifically for our times and our situation. There are references to Occupy Wall Street, Lindsay Lohan, the GOP race, and Britney Spears among others. See the brief trailer/montage of the show below:



After the jump, listen to a clip of Hunter Parrish singing one of the show's songs "Beautiful City."

Daniel Radcliffe: Entertainer and Hero

It wasn't really surprising that Entertainment Weekly, which has shown much love to the Harry Potter series from the very beginning, awarded this year's Entertainer of the Year Award to the man himself, Daniel Radcliffe. The final film after all was released this year and made over $1 billion worldwide. Now he may not get nominated for an Oscar, he shouldn't, but I still thought he delivered a relatively great performance this year as the bespectacled not-so-young-anymore wizard.

Of course, he has been doing double duty all year trying to juggle the appearances and promotions for the final film with his leading role in Broadway's How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying alongside Tony winner John Larroquette. While Radcliffe was passed over (yet again) for a Tony nomination, he delivered one of the more impressive numbers at this year's ceremony, which is saying a lot considering the talents that were on that stage that night.

All of that makes Entertainment Weekly's choice almost a no-brainer, but I also hope they took into account Radcliffe's unending and inspiring work with The Trevor Project. He was even awarded The Trevor Hero Award earlier this year. Watch his acceptance speech after the cut, but here's an excerpt from the speech:

Go boldly and honestly through the world. Learn to love the fact that there's nobody else quite like you. And you will be, to plagiarize and paraphrase all at once, the heroes of your own lives. I thank The Trevor Project for this amazing award. Out of everything I've done, I can truly say the thing I'm proudest of is my association with Trevor. It is an outstanding organization which saves lives everyday and I look forward to helping it in any way I can for the rest of my career.

Tomorrow is a latter day...

I'm not sure how many times I tried to win lottery tickets for The Book of Mormon, but I wouldn't be shocked if it was at least a dozen times. But the waiting came to an end this past weekend as I won the lottery and finally saw the Tony-winning musical. And let me tell you, it was a fucking riot.

Now the only things I knew about the musical were that it was put together by a team consisting of the creators of South Park and the composer for Avenue Q, it had something to do with the Mormon faith, and that it won a crapload of Tony Awards a few months back (9 in total). So I had a few expectations about the tone (funny, crude, endearing) and quality (very high) and my expectations were met and then some.


Tony nominees Andrew Rannells and Josh Gad play the two leads as Mormon missionaries Elder Price and Elder Cunningham respectively paired up to spread the word in Uganda. Their odd couple relationship is played for laughs as well as their fish out of water experience in AIDS-riddled warlord-terrorized Africa. The rest of the ensemble contains the other Mormon missionaries led by the effervescent and Tony nominee Rory O'Malley as well as the native villagers which includes Tony winner Nikki James who takes an interest in the "white boys."

The songs and choreography are as wonderful and memorable as they are varied. The show really tried to mix and match various styles and elements--big ballads, tap numbers, a play within a play, chorus lines, a song that will now be a regular part of my Halloween playlist, etc., but it never felt overwhelming or chaotic. Because underneath the crudeness is real heart which grounded the show from the first "Hello!" It's hard to pick a favorite performer, scene, or song. But I'll say O'Malley's performance in "Turn It Off" is the one I kept coming back to. Let's just say I related to it a lot. Also, how adorable is he? I mean seriously. Rannells' performance of "I Believe" is also quite the showstopper and he duly performed it magnificently at the Tony Awards.

With the numbers it's been doing, this show is going to be around for awhile. Sure the cast will inevitably change, but the words and songs will remain and I hope everyone gets to experience them at least once. Hasa Diga Eebowai!

Perfect 10 for Elle Woods

During the past decade, Reese Witherpoon won the Academy Award for Walk the Line and starred in five films grossing over $90 million (including doing voice work on Monsters Vs. Aliens). And yet if you ask me her greatest role of the past decade, I'd probably say it was Elle Woods with her go-get-em attitude, endless pink ensemble, scented resumes, Delta Nu pride, and vast knowledge of hair care rules. I bring all of this up today because it happens to be the 10th Anniversary of Legally Blonde.

"You got into Harvard Law?" "What? Like, it's hard?"

It's been awhile since I've seen it, but the one thing I remember about the film is how FUN it was and how charming Reese was in it. Actually that's a lie, since I remember another thing from the film, The Bend and Snap.

And speaking of what-the-heck-have-they-been-up-to, what is Jennifer Coolidge doing at the moment? A quick IMDb search says she's mostly doing TV in The Secret Life of the American Teenager and will soon reprise her role as Stifler's mom in another American Pie film. And I'm getting sidetracked here. Where were we? Oh right... Legally Blonde, bend and snap, Reese needs to do more movies like these, etc. So yeah, lovely memories. Victor Garber playing a sleazy guy, Luke Wilson at his most adorkable, Holland Taylor before she sold her soul to Two and a Half Men... good times.

And again, just a really fun film with some great work from Witherspoon. I also still think of the movie whenever Hoku's "Perfect Day" pops up in my mp3 player.

Updated: I also want to say one reason to love the film is that it spawned a pretty good Broadway musical. I especially love, love this showstopper of a number by Laura Bell Bundy:

Looking Forward To...

Company
Music and Lyrics: Stephen Sondheim
Screenings: June 15, 16, 19, and 21
Starring: Neil Patrick Harris, Aaron Lazar, Patti Lupone, Anika None Rose, Chryssie Whitehead, Jon Cryer, Craig Beirko, Katie Finneran, Jill Paice, Christina Hendricks, Martha Plimpton, Jim Walton, Jennifer Laura Thompson, and Stephen Colbert

Tony Awards Winners

It was a largely sweepy night at the Tony Awards last night as The Book of Mormon, War Horse, The Normal Heart, and Anything Goes took the top prizes and the lion share of the rest of the awards.

The winners are below.

Best Play: War Horse
Best Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Revival of a Play: The Normal Heart
Best Revival of a Musical: Anything Goes

Best Actor, Play: Mark Rylance, Jerusalem
Best Actress, Play: Frances McDormand, Good People
Best Actor, Musical: Norbert Leo Butz, Catch Me If You Can
Best Actress, Musical: Sutton Foster, Anything Goes
Best Featured Actor, Play: John Benjamin Hickey, The Normal Heart
Best Featured Actress, Play: Ellen Barkin, The Normal Heart
Best Featured Actor, Musical: John Larroquette, How to Succeed in Business
Best Featured Actress, Musical: Nikki M. James. Book of Mormon

Best Direction of a Musical: Casey Nicholaw & Trey Parker, Book of Mormon
Best Direction of a Play: Marianne Elliott & Tom Morris, War Horse
Best Book of a Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Costume Design for a Play: Importance of Being Earnest
Best Costume Design for a Musical: Priscilla Queen of the Desert
Best Scenic Design for a Play: War Horse
Best Scenic Design for a Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Lighting Design for a Play: War Horse
Best Lighting Design of a Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Choreography: Anything Goes
Best Score for a Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Orchestrations for a Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Sound Design for a Musical: Book of Mormon
Best Sound Design in a Play: War Horse

The ceremony itself was highly enjoyable and seem to be getting almost universally good reviews throughout the blogosphere. A small part of that is surely due to the wonderfully singing-dancing-rapping host Neil Patrick Harris who really did do a lot and yet never encroached on the awards being given out. It's difficult to pick a highlight since everything he did was truly inspired--from his hilarious opening number to his duet with Hugh Jackman, from his 30-second Spider-Man joke fest to his freestyle rap to end the show. He even performed a number from Company with an all-star cast.

The other performances, mostly from all of the nominated musicals, were also fantastic. While Patina Miller and Sutton Foster blew the roofs with their numbers and Andrew Rannells delivered a showstopper, I was most impressed by Daniel Radcliffe who was singing and dancing with such ferocity and skill, it was like he's been in Broadway for years. Well done, young Harry.

The Normal Heart, Redux

This past weekend, I went to see The Normal Heart after seeing it last month in previews. From the looks of it, they didn't make any big changes now that the show is out of previews, but I did notice that some scenes felt a bit more visceral. Now whether or not that is because the actors are performing it differently or me just having a better understanding of the whole play, I really don't know, but what I do know is that the play didn't lose any of the heart and passion that bowled me over the first time I saw it. One of the great things though was to see Larry Kramer himself outside the theater after the play ended.

The Normal Heart has been getting rave reviews upon rave reviews since it came out. Ben Brantley over at the New York Times notes that "by the play's end even people who think they have no patience for polemical theater may find their resistance has melted into tears." Hollywood Reporter writer David Rooney remarks how "its trenchancy and impassioned urgency reach out and grab you by the throat with the force of an explosive new work." Marilyn Stasio of Variety says the play works "because it has the power to move and disturb us." And finally, Robert Berg calls the new revival "the most important production Broadway has seen in years." (Click here for a few more reviews)

The play was recently nominated for 5 Tony Awards--Best Revival of a Play, Best Direction of a Play, and acting nominations for Joe Mantello, John Benjamin Hickey, and Ellen Barkin. It also picked up 3 Drama League Awards nominations and 2 Outer Critics Circle nominations, winning Best Play Revival for both. The ensemble was also given a special award during the Drama Desk Awards. Check out the video below to see its opening night:


If you're in New York City, definitely check out this great play which has a limited run through July 10. Buy tickets now.

Must See: The Normal Heart

This past Saturday, I saw The Normal Heart, one of the most powerful and important plays I have ever seen on Broadway. When I first heard about the play, the only things I knew about it were that it dealt with the AIDS crisis in New York City back in the early 80s and that a few of my favorite actors have been cast. Seeing Larry Kramer's play in person though was really an unforgettable experience. Let's just say that if you do end up seeing this, and I highly recommend that you do, bring lots of tissues.

Joe Mantello plays the main character Ned Weeks. I knew nothing about the actor before this play and he simply blew me away. Ellen Barkin plays the doctor that convinces Ned to take action by informing the gay community about this new disease killing everyone. While Barkin was solid, I felt she overacted a lot of her scenes, which actually worked out well in the second act as her frustrations and anger become much more palpable and justified.

Lee Pace, Jim Parsons, and Patrick Breen play Ned's associates who help him form an organization to take lead in this battle. Their disagreements with one another and especially with Ned's aggressive way of dealing with others form the backbone of the play.


Pace looks ridiculously handsome even with his 80s porntache and he and Mantello get a few great scenes to duke it out while Parsons' is left with the bulk of the play's comic relief referring himself as the "Southern Bitch" and flirting with most of the cast. It really is a sight to behold. Breen gets the least flashy role, but one of the best monologues/scenes in the play when he breaks down in front of his friends after being fed up by this seemingly hopeless fight. It is one of the many times I was openly sobbing. Luke McFarlane plays two bit roles, but it looks like he had a great time for his Broadway debut.


Finally we have Mark Harelik who plays Ned's brother and John Benjamin Hickey who play's Ned's lover. The relationships they both have with Ned are important parts to the play as wells as to Ned's formation as a character. While Harelik seemed a bit too reserved for my liking, Hickey was phenomenally open making most of his scenes all the more heart-wrenching and real.

So in summary, go see this play. It is not only beautiful and heartbreaking, but it is also an important part of gay history. It is only running for a limited 12-week run, but I hope it stays on longer even with a different cast, because I truly believe that everyone should see (or read) this play at least once.

Read a similarly positive review over at AfterElton.com.

The Normal Heart

I don't really know much about The Normal Heart other than it being centered around the AIDS crisis happening in New York City during the 80s, which is intriguing enough, but the Broadway cast looks absolutely, positively amazing.


It caught my eye when I first heard that Emmy winner Jim Parsons and Emmy nominated Lee Pace were going to be part of the cast. I've been a long-time fan of Lee Pace since I saw him in Wonderfalls and he has followed that with some inspired work in Pushing Daisies and The Fall. It was after I was already obsessed with him that I discovered his brilliant work in Soldier's Girl where he plays a transgendered performer. I only really know Parsons from his hilarious work in Big Bang Theory, but I'm looking forward to seeing him play a role that's hopefully vastly different from his vaguely autistic character on the show.

Now comes word that the adorable Luke McFarlane will be joining the ensemble and it's apparently his Broadway debut. I know him from Brothers & Sisters and I think his addition to the cast will be perfect. The rest of the cast include Ellen Barkin, Joe Mantello, John Benjamin Hickey, and Patrick Breen. The play will have a limited 12-week engagement starting next month.

Wicked Good Time

When I posted a few of my favorite films from last year yesterday, I said I'd have my top ten today. Unfortunately, yesterday was a bit busier than expected so you'll have to wait one more day. But speaking of being busy yesterday...

I had every intention of staying at home, but a friend wanted to hang out in the city (New York City for the unawares). We tried to get rush tickets for The Importance of Being Earnest, but unfortunately they didn't have them for that day. My memory is hazy regarding the plot, but I saw the film only five years ago in college and remembered absolutely loving it.

We decided to try for Wicked's lottery, but with its popularity, we had very little hope and indeed we didn't get it. We rushed over to do the lottery for American Idiot next and also didn't win, but since we both wanted to see Melissa Etheridge in her one-week engagement, we decided to buy partial view tickets. I was fine with that since I had already seen the musical a couple months back. Etheridge was fantastic and her guttural voice and sharp shrieks worked perfectly for the St. Jimmy role. As for the cast, they were again phenomenal and I'm hoping the rumor that Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day pursuing opportunities to adapt this into a feature film happens. Yes, the plot needs to be more substantial, but I think it can work ala Julie Taymor's Across the Universe. In fact, why not hire Taymor? Well at least after she deals with Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.

After grabbing some insanely decadent hot chocolate at The City Bakery, we tried the lottery for Wicked again. Of course with it being the night showing, there were more people wanting tickets and we were so discouraged we hung out in the back so as to make a quick getaway. It was for naught, however, as I heard my name being called. Fast forward to us seating in the second row of Wicked and let me tell you the stage was just amazing to behold with its steampunk quality complete with a robotic dragon high above the audience's heads which billowed smoke at the beginning of the musical. I've listened to the soundtrack countless of times, but the actual play really filled it many holes which I was too lazy to fill via wikipedia or actually reading the book the musical was based on.

But I said on twitter last night, it was all just breathtaking. From the singing, the production, the costume... THE COSTUME. They are magnificent. It's hard to pick a favorite, but Elphaba's final dress, though mostly black, was so intricate it looked like a work of art. And just so I remember down the line, I saw it with Teal Wicks playing Elphaba, Katie Rose Clarke as Glinda, and Kyle Dean Massey playing Fiyero. They were all pretty damn good.

Now what's taking the movie version so long? Is it a matter of the producers worrying that a movie version would hurt the massively successful Broadway version? I think that's hogwash and they really should strike while the iron is hot. As far as I know there's no Wicked movie in production at the moment, but there are a bunch of other Oz-related films in the pipeline so we won't lack for that. The most high profile of them all is Disney's The Great And Powerful which tells the Oz story from the eyes of the Wizard. Directed by Sam Raimi and slated for a 2013 release, it's currently having trouble finding the actor to play its lead. Robert Downey, Jr. was originally cast, but was then replaced by Johnny Depp, who then turned it down and now the rumor mill is saying James Franco is being considered the role.

Whatever man, though now that I think about it... Franco as Scarecrow, Depp as Tin Man, and Downey Jr. as Cowardly Lion. Genius. Someone greenlight that movie!

The subliminal mind fuck America...

Saw American Idiot on Broadway last weekend and really enjoyed it. The cast is incredibly talented and their endurance is something to behold especially after some of these intense numbers. The music of Green Day really lends itself to the "plot" they came up with, but I'm sure it helped that I knew Green Day's music well before seeing the play.

The cast recently performed six songs over in AOL Sessions. Here is the cast singing the title song, "American Idiot:"



For those interested, the musical tells the story of three friends (played by Michael Esper, John Gallagher Jr., and Stark Sands) and how their lives take different paths (fatherhood, drugs, and the army respectively).

Stuck on Next to Normal & Inception

To be honest, I think the one-two punch of Next to Normal and Inception on Saturday broke me just a little bit. I've probably listened to the soundtrack of Next to Normal 5-6 times now and I can't even count how many theories and reviews of Inception I have read the past few days.

The funny thing is for both I actually expected to have some sort of life-altering experience while I was watching them and was a tiny bit disappointed when that didn't happen. But then I couldn't get them out of my mind for days! Even now, I'm strongly contemplating in seeing Inception again as the soundtrack for Next to Normal plays in the background.

Unfortunately not a lot of people I know have seen Next to Normal, but there's no shortage of people I can talk to about Inception. And thank goodness since it's definitely that type of movie that require debate and conversation after viewing. It's not a spoiler to say that there are just so many intricate layers to this film and yet I'm so heartened to see the audiences are not letting this stop them from watching. In fact when I saw it last Saturday night in a packed theater, the audience was wonderful. While the movie was two and a half hours, the audience never once seemed restless. Everyone was just so focused and captivated with the film that it was no big surprise that at the end there were lots of cheering and clapping.

[Image re-blogged from Fujiidom]

The score and the visual effects were epic as expected, but the cast was also just a joy to watch. See above image for all the pretty. The standouts for me were Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Tom Hardy who had a chemistry that I'm probably reading way more into than expected, but that's my prerogative. Marion Cotillard was gorgeous and effective in all of her scenes and Leonardo DiCaprio delivers yet another star performance. Between this and his performance in Shutter Island, he's bound to see himself nominated for an Oscar this year.

I'll end this rambling entry by going back to Next to Normal. The performance I saw was one of the last ones for Tony winner Alice Ripley and Tony nominee Jennifer Damiano who originated the roles of mother and daughter respectively off- and on Broadway. It was also one of the last performances for Brian D'Arcy James who originated the role of the father off-Broadway. Was very happy I got to see the play with all of them and they were just all fantastic. Unfortunately, I didn't see Aaron Tveit in the role of the son, but Kyle Dean Massey was a fi-ine substitute.